“speak what terrible language you will”: Fooling with the Other in Shakespeare’s All’s Well That Ends Well

Drawing upon modern and early modern theorising on the question of language use and the cultural project of social cohesion, this paper focuses upon the construction of Community and the Other through language in one of Shakespeare’s ‘problem’ plays, All’s Well That Ends Well. Concentrating upon the first scene from Act 4 of Shakespeare’s bitter comedy, particular attention is given to the many and various implications of verbal violence for comic and other purposes in this theatrical staging of the military encampment. At the heart of this presentation lies the humiliated Paroles (words) with his ambiguous foolery and discordant roles in the intrigue. The article closes reflecting on the implications of the speech act, the witness and the victim when the Other is embodied through language.